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Different intelligences’ role in overcoming the differences in employee value

system
Živa Veingerl Čič, Matjaž Mulej, Simona Šarotar Žižek,
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Employee
Different intelligences’ role value system
in overcoming the differences
in employee value system
Živa Veingerl Čič, Matjaž Mulej and Simona Šarotar Žižek 343
Faculty of Economics and Business, Univerza v Mariboru, Maribor, Slovenia

Abstract
Purpose – This paper aims to present the findings of the research about the role of different intelligences in
overcoming the differences in employee value system as a source of success.
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Design/methodology/approach – Based on their previous research, the authors used desk and informal
field research, the Dialectical Systems Theory and its Law of Requisite Holism.
Findings – The integration of one’s personal development with one’s individual intelligence influences
human value systems. Knowledge and developing of various types of intelligence matter: it lets individuals
develop faster, in the long run. The higher one’s level of intelligence is, the easier one finds it to face problems
or experience. Thus, one is becoming a mature personality, who can overcome extreme alternatives to the
briefed human values. This process can also receive meaningful support from the exercise of social
responsibility, which is one’s responsibility for one’s impacts on society, i.e. people and nature. Success of the
process depends on “personal requisite holism”. The top managers need significantly more emotional and
social competences than the others.
Research limitations/implications – The topic is researched with qualitative analysis in desk and
informal field research. Quantitative methodological approach took place in the authors’ cited previous
publications.
Practical implications – Work distribution makes the leaders and subordinates differ in prevailing
values, too. Mastering of these differences will support business success, survival of jobs included and
well-being of coworkers from both groups. Application of the cognitive, emotional and spiritual
intelligences might help the organization meet this need. The fourth – physical intelligence – supports
ensuring the psychological well-being at work; from this, other mentioned intelligences have been
developed. Mastering of these differences can also receive support from methods of creative cooperation,
social responsibility and personal requisite holism; the authors have reported about these elsewhere, and
only point to these in this study.
Social implications – The more holistic intelligences system generates a more socially responsible
society.
Originality/value – No similar concept is offered in the available literature.
Keywords Leaders, Values, Social responsibility, Subordinates,
Intelligence – cognitive, emotional, social, physical and spiritual
Paper type Research paper

1. Introduction: the selected challenge and aspect of addressing it

One division of people in the modern society is similar to those of previous millennia: leaders
and subordinates. Both groups are necessary owing to the division and organization of work,
but different in their prevailing values, culture, ethics and norms (VCEN). VCEN make them
use their skills and opportunities differently – hopefully in synergies and for the mutual benefit Kybernetes
of the entire society and nature. Among other topics, this raises the following question: For Vol. 47 No. 2, 2018
pp. 343-358
which VCEN should people be educated for both groups to be happy and socially beneficial © Emerald Publishing Limited
0368-492X
rather than unhappy and socially harmful? Our suggestions are based on the experience and DOI 10.1108/K-06-2017-0200
 K fact that there is ample literature on “knowledge management”, but the experience has
47,2 overseen that the knowledge, skills and values are interdependent (Mulej, 1974, 1979; Mulej
et al., 2013; etc.). The experience of “knowledge and values interdependence” receives explicit
formulation in “knowledge-cum-values management” (Šarotar Žižek and Mulej, 2013;
Zlatanovi
c and Mulej, 2015; Mulej, 2016).

344 2. Background: brief summary of visible extreme alternatives of human VCEN

Table I details a brief summary of extreme alternatives. We may be able to overcome these
differences, if we do more for the development and use of intelligence.

3. Methodology
Based on a systematic literature search, the databases dLib.si, ProQuest and Cobbis.si were
reviewed in 2016. We searched literature with the following keywords: cognitive, emotional,
social, physical and spiritual intelligences, leaders, values, Dialectical Systems Theory,
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social responsibility. We added the search of literature on the human resources

management, organizational behavior, psychology and Systems Theory (especially the
requisite holism by systemic approach). Limitations included the searched period: we
studied only publications since 2003, to obtain the latest and updated information on the
studied issues. We focused on the literature in Slovene and English languages. Other
restrictions were not made.

3.1 Review results

We searched sources in the University of Maribor’s databases, covering 7,883 hits. We
selected 64 relevant sources (Figure 1).

3.2 Quality score review and description of the data processing

The selected sources were published in 2003-2016. We excluded double sources, as well as
the ones whose content is insufficiently connected with the subject, purpose and objective of
our research. To analyze the technical and scientific content, we synthesized the results, and
considered availability, content and contextual relevance. We chose 64 sources covering our
topic and objectives and contributing with high quality to our research.

4. Intelligence and types of intelligence

The concept of intelligence is relatively old. It belongs to the most frequently mentioned
concepts in psychological, pedagogical and artistic–essayistic literature. Most definitions of
intelligence emphasize the aspects of general intellectual working (Fekonja, 2001, p. 15). The
“general” definition of intelligence could be divided into five groups Musek (1993, p. 186):
(1) the ability of thinking, mental judging, understanding and insight in relations;
(2) to adapt to new situations, creativity and performance adjustment;
(3) to use knowledge; ability to solve problems and tasks;
(4) to learn; and
(5) of effectiveness in mutual relations.

There are at least seven types of intelligence, including linguistic, musical, logical-
mathematical, spatial, bodily-motor, two personal intelligences – knowledge of oneself and
the other (Gardner, 1995). Each of the listed human potential intelligences is associated with
one of the three basic neural systems in the brain; all intelligences described by Gardner are
 No. Typical characteristics of leaders/bosses Typical characteristics of subordinates
Employee
value system
1 Entrepreneurial spirit Obedience
2 Entrepreneurship Employment
3 Tendency to risk Security favored
4 Sense of superiority and the right of abuse due Sense of the right to abuse subordination, e.g. by
to power irresponsibility
5 Dominance (’I can do everything without Subordination (“I can do nothing, I’m neither in 345
liability’), imposing charge”), waiting
6 Ambition: wealth (and to pose with it) Duty to live modestly (and envy the rich)
7 VCEN of superiority VCEN of inferiority
8 Risk of complacency and self-sufficiency, Risk of frustration, causing poor work
causing poor work
9 Tendency to a sense of infallibility Tendency to passivity
10 Need for requisite holism at all levels of the Duty to be narrow specialists, limited to the
entire organization/unit given tasks and prescribed work procedures,
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limiting their requisite holism

11 Need for creative cross-professional cooperation Duty and the right to be limited within one’s
in teamwork assigned work/tasks, over-specialists
12 Need for innovation and thus for inventive and Duty to obey the prescribed routines and to be
innovative, not only creative co-workers routineers without innovation, inventiveness
and initiatives
13 Need to achieve competitiveness in the market Duty and desire to avoid the market
14 Needing a requisitely holistic picture of one’s Duty and desire to work strictly only within
organization and its environment one’s assigned work and tasks
15 Needing a long-term orientation Duty to consider only the here and now
16 tendency to address co-workers as assets - duty to behave as tools without creativity,
‘human resources, capital’ beneficial to the organization
17 Need to totally exploit all resources, including Feeling abuse, overload and/or weak use of
staff capacity
18 Profit is the only performance measure Pay is the only performance/respect measure
19 CSR is only a source of profit CSR is a source of good life
20 Government is a servant of entrepreneurs Government should solve the problems of all
citizens
21 Partial, not requisite personal holism Partial, not requisite personal holism
22 Own psychological well-being, even if causing Unawareness of one’s psychological well- being
poor well-being of others except outside work
23 Partial awareness and use of one’s own potential Unawareness of one’s own potentials and their
for the benefit of society usefulness to society
24 Self-confidence, even without real foundations Self-unconfidence, even without real foundations
25 No recognition of bosses’ inter-dependence with Ignorance of one’s interdependence with all due
co-workers at the so-called lower positions to narrowly specialized training/practice
26 Neglecting the importance of safety at work Increasing number of incidents and resulting
damage
27 Neglecting the importance of health at work Illness, absenteeism, presentism Table I.
28 Neglecting the importance of free time each day Risk of burn-out Typical
and week characteristics of
29 Neglecting the importance of the family for co- Risk of family breakdown and bad habits of leaders and
workers young people
30 Neglecting the importance of holidays for Risk of burn-out
subordinates
employees’ health compared as
extremes
Source: Authors’ own from Mulej and Čagran (2016), supplemented (stereotypes)
 K
47,2

346
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Figure 1.
Research process
flowchart

actually versions of the three basic intelligences – the intellectual, emotional and spiritual
intelligence and related neuronal systems Zohar and Marshall (2000, p. 14).
First, they equated human intelligence with rational intelligence (IQ). Psychologists
developed special tests to measure IQ. Then in the 1960s, they found a contradiction
between the intelligence tests and test results. With the IQ they measured only rational,
logical, linear intelligence with which people solve certain kinds of logical problems; it is
used for certain types of strategic thinking. In the 1990s, Goleman (1997) found that
emotions are a very important factor of human intelligence and introduced the concept of
emotional intelligence (EQ). Zohar (2006, pp. 91-92) introduced the third type of intelligence
and named it spiritual intelligence. There are also the physical and social intelligence; we
will detail these later.
Let us add Howard Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences; his early work detected
the initial six intelligences as a person’s unique aptitude set of capabilities and how one
might prefer to demonstrate intellectual abilities; today there are nine intelligences
(Gardner, 2010):
(1) Verbal-linguistic intelligence (well-developed verbal skills and sensitivity to the
sounds, meanings and rhythms of words).
(2) Logical-mathematical intelligence (ability to think conceptually and abstractly, and
capacity to discern logical and numerical patterns).
(3) Spatial-visual intelligence (capacity to think in images and pictures, to visualize
accurately and abstractly).
(4) Bodily-kinesthetic intelligence (ability to control one’s body movements and to
handle objects skillfully).
(5) Musical intelligences (ability to produce and appreciate rhythm, pitch and timber).
 (6) Interpersonal intelligence (capacity to detect and respond appropriately to the Employee
moods, motivations and desires of others). value system
(7) Intrapersonal (capacity to be self-aware and in tune with inner feelings, values,
beliefs and thinking processes).
(8) Naturalist intelligence (ability to recognize and categorize plants, animals and
other objects in nature).
(9) Existential intelligence (sensitivity and capacity to tackle deep questions about 347
human existence such as: What is the meaning of life? Why do we die? How did we
get here?).

We will highlight only the emotional, spiritual, physical and social intelligences, as they are
strongly related and determine the behavior of managers, influence their attitude toward
humans and organizations and the decisions. This can have long-term consequences for all
stakeholders.
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4.1 Emotional intelligence

A major role in the personal growth belongs to several intelligences or competences. The
experts define EQ as one’s ability to observe, understand and monitor one’s emotions and
the emotions of other people, separating them from each other, and the knowledge to use
these findings to influence work and guide one’s coworkers. Some define EQ as social skills
making humans successful in relationship with themselves and with others (Možina, 2002,
p. 511). To some, EQ covers human emotional needs, initiatives and real values (Simmons
and Simmons, 2000, p. 20).
Salovey and Mayer developed the theory of EQ in the 1990s (Goleman, 2001, p. 338); they
defined EQ as one’s ability to monitor and manage the emotions and feelings of others and
the ability to listen to the feelings that guide human thinking and actions. Goleman (2001,
pp. 338-339) reworked and designed this model in five basic emotional and social skills:
awareness of self, control of self, promoting the self, empathy and social skills. So EQ is
one’s ability to recognize one’s own feelings and the feelings of others, the ability to self-
motivate and manage emotions in one-selves and in relations with others (Goleman, 2001).
EQ encompasses skills that differ from the cognitive academic intelligence, measurable IQ;
EQ complements these. Other authors also addressed EQ; e.g. Chernisse and Adler (2000),
Simmons and Simmons (2000), Kravitz and Schubert (2000), Trojnar (2002) and Warner
(2002), etc.
More and more organizations seek to adopt EQ. Goleman (2001, p. 322) in his survey
identified the following approaches to the management of employees:

Balance between planning of human and financial issues in the company.

Commitment to the basic organizational strategy.

Inflaming the incentive to increase productivity, openly communicate, build
relationships within and outside the company, with which one can gain competitive
advantage, cooperation, assistance and equal participation in the distribution of
resources and the relationship between them in innovations, risk, learning and
competitive zeal and the desire for continuous progress.

Differences shown in Table I, are sources of the problems and require management.
4.1.1 Skills of emotional intelligence which influence the personality of leaders. EQ does
not include only personal skills, but also those that determine how one fits into one’s social
environment. Thus, on the one hand, one talks about the personalities and, on the other
 K hand, about social skills. The first skill includes self-management and administrative skills,
47,2 covering empathy and relationship management. These areas are closely intertwined, as
self-awareness belongs in the personal scope, influencing compassion and the like.
The first awareness for a successful leader to know and adopt is self-awareness. Goleman
(2001, p. 41) defined it as knowledge of the inner experience, bigger affection, internal
resources and internal perception. Self-awareness is key to successful management; based
348 on it, leaders overcome the barriers, possible in their relations with employees. Thus, when
leaders always recognize their emotions and are aware of them, too, they can control and
modify the potential negative behavior of employees. Leaders must accept their feelings,
consider them and reflect them without hindering their work; on this basis, they must
consciously focus on their values and goals.
Dealing is a second discovery of EQ leaders. Mastering one’s emotions means knowledge
leading them, to find a way to react by certain feelings, their recognition and understanding
of the importance and impact on others (Možina, 2002, p. 512). It is good for business that
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managers in stressful situations remain concentrated, in positive mood and fearless, to

maintain a clear mind under pressure.
Recognizing emotions in others is (following Goleman) the next attribute of successful
leaders, who must be aware of employees, their feelings, needs and concerns before giving
them guidance to achieve their personal goals. Hence, the leaders must first recognize their
own emotional fluctuations.
The EQ categories include also the relationship management. EQ relationship
management skills enable the leaders to understand other people, successfully communicate
with them and establish good relationships. The relationship between the subordinates and
their leader is a complex circular phenomenon, hiding many elements which humans are not
even aware of, do not notice them, but spontaneously govern all of them (Brajša, 1983, p. 81).
Successful leaders do not necessarily have all EQ abilities. The very effective leaders
usually have a critical mass of skills in about six emotionally intelligent abilities (Goleman
et al., 2002, p. 58). A leader can transform the least productive and very negative department
of the company into its most efficient part, by using the learned EQ skills (Lundin et al.,
2002, p. 113): e.g. the skill of awareness of one’s mistakes, acting and transferring this
capability on employees owing to one’s self-confidence and optimistic sentiments.
4.1.2 Leadership styles based on the emotional intelligence. Leadership styles result from
many factors, including the very important leader’s personality. Goleman (2001, pp. 75-100)
discusses the six management methods, which humans could in certain circumstances
transfer from one to another:
(1) Visionary truly believes in a vision; he/she can therefore decisively lead people to
its achievement. His/her characteristics are self-confidence, optimism, sincerity,
determination, empathy and helping people, who he/she constantly warns of the
broader significance of their work.
(2) Mentor consults; he/she excels in self-awareness and empathy into the employees’
feelings. Mentor must be honest, a good listener, must show confidence in the
ability of people, provide them with advice and help them in their personal
development.
(3) Comrade strives for friendly communication and relationships, built on the
emotional needs of employees. He/she gives them priority over the work objectives.
This does not provide the most effective leadership necessarily, but forms a
positive atmosphere.
 (4) Democratic leader has skills based on cooperation, empathy and conflict resolution. Employee
He/she is a very good listener and behaves as an equal team member; this gives value system
employees a sense of importance and motivation.
(5) Perfectionist includes in his/her EQ skills the desire to constantly seek ways to
improve the productivity of all employees, while he/she seeks to meet his/her own
high criteria of excellence. He/she lacks the ability of compassion, is not skillful to
communicate well and cannot control own emotions. 349
(6) Authoritative leader is suitable for the crisis management: he/she gives employees
clear instructions for their work; thus, he/she can quickly lead the company out of
a critical situation. In other circumstances, this way of management is not
appropriate: the leaders’ characteristics cause a very egoistic behavior. Such
managers rarely praise and often criticize subordinates, thereby destroying their
satisfaction and motivation.
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4.1.3 Measuring the emotional intelligence. The EQ quotient can show what areas of
leader’s personality are suitable, and which ones are either too strong or too weak.
This can improve the leader’s relations to his/her employees and vice versa. The
bases for EQ measurement include: emotional energy, emotional tension, optimism,
self-respect, work devotion, precision, wish to change, courage, determination, self-
promotion, tolerance, consideration and sociability (Simmons and Simmons, 2000).
The higher level of these factors causes higher individual positive and emotional
intelligence.
EQ can be measured by long-term observation of employee, personal conversations
with him/her and subordinates’ surveys about leaders’ behavior. Klemencic (2002, p. 3)
speaks about the rapid EQ test with the assumption that the EQ person can express
emotions in rich vocabulary and write at least 30 words in 3 min, which speak about her
emotional state. The 20-23 written words indicate a fairly accurate expression of
emotion; the 10-20 written words talk about the fact that the individual needs
many exercises to express feelings; less than 10 words rank the person as a less EQ
person.
4.1.4 Personality of leaders under influence of emotional intelligence. EQ tackles work
performance (Druskat et al., 2006). The link between emotional intelligence and employee
satisfaction matters (Ealias and George, 2012).
Every person is sensitive to emotions, but it depends on the individual how he/she ranks
them in everyday life, which shows EQ. Leaders must (Wilks, 2001, pp. 42-49):

balance their emotional temperament;

be active listeners and able to be empathic to emotions of their employees;

understand the projection of their feelings to the others;

be able to adopt their own shady side; and

have commitment to emotional transformation.

Management of employees may offer great experience for the individual working on
personal development; so, it is good to take even the most difficult task as a challenge rather
than an obstacle that could prevent one’s success in life. Developing a high EQ and IQ
enables one to provide guidance for the highest level of development, but it requires the
skills of spiritual intelligence.
 K 4.2 Spiritual intelligence
47,2 4.2.1 The definition of spiritual intelligence
In order to create wealth (spiritual capital), which results from the purpose of life, life-related
values and the basic meaning of life, we need a sense for purpose of life and its values and the
sense of the basic meaning of life (spiritual intelligence, SI). SI is the intelligence that enables us to
perceive the deepest purpose of life, its highest values, meaning and deepest motives. SI is the
way we use our process of thinking when we decide and when we do things that we find worth
350 doing (Zohar, 2006, p. 13).
SI is, in terms of corporate management, the philosophy that changes the meaning and the
purpose of business to ensure prosperity. Therefore, SI, enhanced by spiritual capital,
matters for the modern management and operations of organizations and establishes a new
business paradigm.
SI is the inner life of mind and spirit linking them with the wider world; it includes the
ability to deeply understand the existential issues at multiple levels of consciousness and
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awareness such as the soul, which is the lifeblood of creative evolution (Vaughan, 2002,
pp. 13-23). SI is the intelligence of the soul, coming from the heart and the universe (Trojnar,
2002, p. 27). SI is the intelligence with which we work on questions of meaning and evaluate
whether our way is better than other ways. Emmons (2000) wondered whether the
spirituality is intelligence.
Unlike SI, the EQ focuses on the individual’s inner feelings and emotions in relations with
people, but is not merging these two skills (Goleman in Zohar and Marshall, 2000, p. 23). The
first skill reaches from eliminating gaps between one-selves and others and contributes to
the understanding of the real world without illusions to the perception of “who we are, what
we are committing to, what the matters mean to us, and how they position other people and
their meaning into our own world”.
EQ enables humans’ awareness of the situation in which he/she is located and how to
react in this situation; this knowledge covers even the possibility that the same human
decides to stay in this situation. One has an option to create a new, more appropriate
position. Each intelligence is the strongest in an area where it operates independently, but
for the full/requisitely holistic human personality, all three intelligences, namely,
intellectual, emotional and spiritual, are decisive.
The SI is not equal to religion. Religon suggests dogmas, habits, customs, generating
control over behavior of believers. SI is considering only its own vision of the world, generating
monopoly over spirituality. Religions try to master humans with scary assertions (that we are
evil, may lose our soul), thereby “creating a spiritual pessimism, which raises fears, a sick soul,
a sense of unworthiness and guilt” (Borysenko, 1997, p. 17). In quite the opposite way, SI
improves integration, deepens contacts with the human’s inner world, and with the whole
world. SI’s highest form is the pure unconditional love in the absence of human conscious mind
collecting information for the life from the said outer world.
Managers must develop their responsibility and their respect for others, no matter how
many mistakes they make and how negative their personality is, in all circumstances. They
must also trust in and care for others before they meet their own needs, and be empathetic.
These features express their personal spiritual power with deep roots in their subconscious.
It follows that EQ and SI are in a complex interaction; the understanding of the foundations
of SI is a prerequisite for the development of EQ. SI, developed by people, not organizations
(which are synergies of people) puts eight key questions and provides ability to respond to
them to any person who is willing to sacrifice time and work. These questions include “Who
am I? What is my true nature? How does my consciousness work? What is the relationship?
Which laws operate my life? What is the meaning of life? What is my purpose? What is my
 vision for the future?” EQ focuses on understanding the causes of emotions, the difference Employee
between emotions and feelings, emotion management and development of empathy (George, value system
2007).
4.2.2 Measuring spiritual intelligence. SI is difficult to quantify with any test. The
somehow best method of measurement is to observe ourselves, but this requires a long time.
The necessary qualities of a person with highly developed SI include (Zohar and Marshall,
2000, p. 24):

active and spontaneous flexibility;
351

high degree of self-awareness;

ability to stand and to overcome suffering;

ability to take and overcome pain;

inspiration with vision and values;

hesitation, when one could unnecessarily harm;
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tendency to perceive links between the various issues;

clear tendency to pose questions “Why?” Or “What if?” and to seek “the basic”
responses; and

human being the self (the human can act contrary to the Convention).

SI means high achieving of the above-mentioned features. It adds wisdom and compassion
in relation to the others, regardless of age, gender, status or ethnic origin, understanding
things as they are and identifying the illusions, unconditional love and awareness of the
afterlife. SI is the connection between the inner life of mind and spirit with the outer life and
the service to the world (Vaughan, 2002).
Successful leaders’ high spiritual quotient (SI/SQ) can mean that they confidently operate
because of intuition, direct experience, which generates the acceptance of seemingly
illogical, but later on extremely effective decisions. Unlike IQ and EQ, which indicate the
analytical and the emotional response skills of the leader, SQ reflects the leaders’ ability to
act by using internal conscience, thereby improving their own lives and ways of their fellow
humans.
4.2.3 Personality of leaders in terms of spiritual intelligence. Successful leaders, in terms
of SI, are no persons who have climbed to high positions in the professional career, created a
good name in society and contributed to the significant profit of their companies, but the
contrary. Their wealth is reflected in their factual ability to eliminate clothes and masks, put
on because of the social environment in which they live, and to cheerfully show oneself as
one is, by which one helps other people in need (Mulej et al., 2011). The leader must be aware
that he/she is also a human being with mistakes; hence, he/she builds genuine relationships
with his/her colleagues.
SI pushes leaders to a high level of self-awareness, encouraging them to think about
themselves, their inner lives and motives. Leaders with self-awareness chose responsibility
for their lives and live in accordance with their inner power (Covey, 2000). This exceeds the
role of victims, blaming others (employees) for their own actions or feelings. The essence of
self-awareness is the awareness of boundaries of one’s comfort (Zohar and Marshall, 2000,
p. 265). Hence, one must determine the edge of one’s private and professional relationships
or activities where one should expand and face the challenges, and continually accept and
transform one’s relationships into new opportunities to come.
Characteristics of SI leaders also include their living at every moment, rather than holding on
to the past and the future. To be able to establish this peace in one’s body and mind, one must get
 K rid of fear, worry and tension, which plague one in one’s position permanently. Borysenko (1997,
47,2 p. 25) describes well the problem of anxiety in all activities of life:
In fear the ego closes the person to protect, and his/her awareness of life shrinks to a specific concern or
problem he/she has in mind [. . .] ; in love both, mind and heart, are open to numerous possibilities.
The Amram (2009), Fairholm (2000), Fry (2003), Fry and Slocum (2008), Wolf (2004) and
352 Wigglesworth (2006) pointed out the importance of spiritual leadership. Campuzano and
Seteroff (2010) stressed the importance of a new approach to spiritually oriented
organization. Employees’ growing SI matters too (Marques, 2006).

4.3 Physical and social intelligence

Physical intelligence (PI) is a primary intelligence of living organisms based on their
sensitivity and responsiveness to their energy field (Škoberne, 2008). It is realized through
the nervous system, which is PI’s biological extension. Škoberne (2008) believes that
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physical intelligence serves the individual to adapt to changes in the environment and is
actually responsible for maintaining the good condition of the organism and its consistent
operation. Here, we will no longer speak about PI, but we will focus on social intelligence
(SOI).
Some authors believe (Škoberne, 2008) that SOI is PI and sensitivity in relationships,
which is a mental awareness and ability to control and design one’s own behavior
complements. The notion that effective leadership depends on powerful social circuits in
the brain made researchers extend the EQ concept, and comprise as a more relationship-
based construct of the SI. Goleman and Boyatzis (2008) define SOI as a set of
interpersonal competencies built on specific neural circuits (and related endocrine
systems) that inspires others to be effective.
Karl Albrecht (Gardner, 1995), on the other hand, defines SOI as the ability to get along
and to cooperate well with others; SOI includes one’s awareness of situations and the social
dynamics that can help persons achieve their objectives in dealing with others. It also
involves a certain amount of self-insight and a consciousness of one’s own perceptions and
reaction patterns. While some authors have tried to stretch EQ and SOI to assign them the
same meaning, Gardner (1995) pointed out that EQ and SOI are two distinct dimensions of
competence, SOI being separate but complementary to EQ. SOI is mostly under the influence
of environmental factors and developed from the experiences with other people in one’s
environment; therefore, the verbal and communication skills are very important for one’s
high SOI. SOI turns out to be especially important in crisis that requires social awareness.
The skills, necessary for social awareness are (Goleman, 2015):

Listening: The ability to be totally present for another person, thereby achieving
genuine connection. No attempt tries to make meaning out of the situation – you
provide only attentive presence.

Intuition: The ability to read a situation subconsciously through “energy’s”
presence. The strength of your connection lets you know what you must do in any
given situation to achieve a positive outcome.

Mind empathy: The ability to resonate energetically with another person to
experience what they are feeling, know what they are thinking and intuitively feel
their needs.

Knowing the rules: Every interaction takes place within a social context and its own
rules. You must know the rules and live within their boundaries to be effective in
your social interactions.
 SOI leaders do more than just make people happier at work; SOI leaders must be engaged in, Employee
and focused on, their work (Goleman, 2015). If they are disengaged from their role, they value system
cannot engage others. Engaged leaders can tap into others’ innate SOI – discerning how
people feel and why, expressing appropriate concern and interacting skillfully to encourage
positive states of thinking. The person’s ability to understand feelings, thinking and
behavior of other people as well as his/her own and to behave accordingly is based on this
understanding (Orosová and Gajdošová, 2009). Developing individual’s SOI behavior 353
assumes improvement in self-reflection, reflection of social processes, reflection of the
subjective sense and interpretation of behavior and training of social skills (Frankovský and
Birknerová, 2014). Frankovský and Birknerová (2014) mean that in the common everyday
language, the “SOI behavior” is more or less automatically evaluated as pro-social, moral
and ethical. But social intelligence consists of these components (Silvera et al., 2001):

perceptiveness of the internal states and moods of other people;
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general ability to deal with other people;

knowledge of the social norms of the social life;

ability to orient oneself within social situations;

use of social techniques, which enable manipulation; and

social charm and social adaptation.

5. Some conclusions and practical suggestions

In the selected references we researched the recent findings about the selected research
constructs being as follows: human intelligence, leading and leaders, human values and
values system and systems theory. We integrated all relevant findings into a requisitely
holistic link between the value system of the manager (as a human) and his/her intelligences,
especially the emotional and spiritual intelligences that critically influence the human value
system and his/her successful and prudent behavior in both the business and private life.
To master the basic differences between the extreme values in Table I, particularly the
most influential people – organized by the leaders – must master all five discussed
intelligences; then they will have more opportunities to gain best contributions from
themselves and from their co-workers. To render the EQ and SI, one needs one’s personal
development, too. This teaches humans how to be in agreement with one-selves, how to
accept attitudes and behavior of others, without monitoring the effect of negative feelings
(outrage, sadness, anger, jealousy). At the same time, humans – owing to their personal
development – can understand the causes of several kinds of behavior, and go beyond their
own limited perceptions and beliefs to live better with themselves and others. This provides
a genuine individual contact with oneself and with others, generating fair and satisfactory
relationships without negative thoughts, feelings and responses by focusing on the non-
material, reducing the perceived gap between what one is and what one wants to be.
In practice, on these bases, psychologists regard intelligence as the ability to function
effectively in the world; therefore, different intelligences involve using the existing learning
systems and sensitivity, elaborate and enhance existing knowledge to analyze new
situations and develop new solutions to positively impact the overall performance. The
intelligences pointed out here can be considered as moderate predictors of job performance
and success; leaders and employees who lack SI ad EQ perform more poorly than those high
in conscientiousness and EQ. Poor SI and EQ can be strong predictors of employees’ and
 K leaders’ failure in their careers. One must add that the best performing managers have
47,2 significantly more emotional and social competences than other managers.
Particularly important is the integration of one’s personal development with one’s
individual intelligence. Knowledge and developing of various intelligences matters: it
enables individuals’ faster development, in the long run. The higher is one’s intelligence,
the easier one finds it to face problems or experience. In this way, one is becoming a
354 mature personality who is able to overcome extreme alternatives to the briefed human
values:

P.S.1.: The process of developing all five intelligences and the convergence of the
leading and led people can receive a meaningful support from the methods of
creative collaboration, for example: USOMID, six thinking hats and similar, which
are reported elsewhere (Mulej et al., 2013).

P.S.2.: The same process would also receive meaningful support from the exercise of
social responsibility, which is everyone’s responsibility for one’s impacts on society,
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i.e. people and nature. This is reported elsewhere, too (Mulej and Dyck, 2014; Mulej
et al., 2016; Mulej et al., 2013; Mulej, 2014; Lebe and Mulej, 2014).

P.S.3.: For the success of that process humans’ personal requisite holism matters.
We report this elsewhere (Šarotar Žižek, 2012; Šarotar Žižek et al., 2014a, 2014b;
Šarotar Žižek and Treven, 2014; Šarotar Žižek and Milfelner, 2014).

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About the authors

Živa Veingerl Čič is a PhD Student and Researcher. She has more than 20 years of experience in the
business sector in the field of Marketing, Communication, Consulting, Lecturing and Human
Resource Management. She is author and/or co-author of several scientific articles and/or active
participant at scientific and professional conferences. She is currently upgrading her practical
knowledge with science, preparing her PhD thesis in the field of Human Resource Management. She
is actively involved in research projects and also works as a Researcher at Faculty of Economics and
Business Maribor. Živa Veingerl Čič is the corresponding author and can be contacted at: zivana.
veingerl1@um.si
Matjaž Mulej is a Professor Emeritus at the University of Maribor, Faculty of Economics and
Business, Razlagova, Slovenia; MA in Development Economics and Doctorates in Systems
Theory and in Management. Matjaž Mulej has retired as Professor Emeritus of Systems and
Innovation Theory. There are more than 1,500 publications in more than 40 countries to Matjaž
Mulej’s credit (see: IZUM – Cobiss, 08082). Matjaž Mulej has been a visiting professor abroad for
15 semesters; is the author of the Dialectical Systems Theory and Innovative Business Paradigm
for Catching-up Countries (see: François, 2004, International Encyclopedia). Matjaž Mulej is a
member of New York Academy of Sciences (1996), European Academy of Sciences and Arts,
Salzburg (2004), European Academy of sciences and Humanities, Paris (2004), president of
International Academy of Systems and Cybernetic Sciences, Vienna, (2010 -2012), and is now the
vice president. Matjaž Mulej possesses many “Who is Who” entries, including the Hall of Fame
for Distinguished Accomplishments, ABI, Raleigh, NC.
Simona Šarotar Žižek, Assistant Professor, holds a PhD in Economic and Business Sciences. She
completed up her theoretical knowledge permanently by the practical work. In 1998, she was
employed at (then) Europe’s biggest ready-made clothes factory Mura (based in Slovenia) as the
Assistant Manager in the department for Total Quality Management. In 2004, she became Secretary
of the Managing Board of the mentioned company; later she became the Head of Strategic
Development. After nine years, she joined University of Maribor, Faculty of Economics and Business,
 K in 2007, as Lecturer in Management, specialized for Human Resource Management. She is the head of
the Institute of Organisation and Informatics and she is author and/or co-author of several articles
47,2 published in various international and Slovenian journals and/or presented at scientific and expert
conferences. She is also an author and/or co-author of þ10 scientific monographs and þ20 chapters in
scientific and expert monograph. On several occasions, she was invited to present her papers at
scientific and professional conferences. Otherwise, she was also the leader of international Interreg
projects such as Smart Production, Regio Help and Chance4Change on behalf of partner’s
358 organization. She also participated in other international project such as Inolink, Culture4leadership:
A research of intercultural leadership competencies in four different EU-countries. She was actively
involved in research projects: in Targeted Research Project and at the basic research project, led by
Dr Mulej. She also works as a Consultant for companies.
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